


just say hey, if it feels alright

by plinys



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Crack Treated Seriously, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-07 03:17:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20302567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinys/pseuds/plinys
Summary: Most people’s soulmate marks show up on their arms, along their sides, or just usually somewhere less visible. Nate would have even accepted one on his back, difficult to read unless looking in a mirror, but there it is when he wakes up, one word dark black against his right cheekbone.'Hey.'





	just say hey, if it feels alright

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shesthemuscle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shesthemuscle/gifts).

> Shout out to Mikal for the prompt!
> 
> This is vaguely set in the same universe as my other cracky soulmate au, but it's only a small reference so no big deal if you haven't read that one!

Nate is sixteen when the word  _ Hey  _ appears on his cheek. 

Most people’s soulmate marks show up on their arms, along their sides, or just usually somewhere less visible. Nate would have even accepted one on his back, difficult to read unless looking in a mirror, but there it is when he wakes up, one word dark black against his right cheekbone. 

_ Hey _ . 

“Hey for Heywood,” Ava teases him when he rolls up for school the morning after his birthday with his soulmate mark there and visible for everyone to see.

He lets her get away with it, only because she’s wearing long sleeves even during the summer heat to hide the fact that she has the words  _ tentacle up your ass  _ on her arm, a lovely gift from her future soulmate.

In comparison, his simple, but very visible mark, doesn’t seem like the worst thing ever. 

At least, at first.

The problem is with a soulmate mark so simple, and so visible, he hears the word from strangers too often to even count. How many times does he meet someone new for the first time, someone else with a simple soulmate mark, a one in a million mark, hoping that when they greet Nate with a simple  _ Hey  _ that he will reply with whatever it is marking their skin.

He never does get it right. 

No matter how many times his heart thuds in his chest at the familiar word spoken again from a set of unfamiliar lips, it always ends up the same, with the feeling of not being right there, with the sparks never appearing when their hands finally touch. 

“Maybe I’m destined to be alone,” Nate announces, a little drunk after a college party, and three more ‘Hey’s that didn’t amount to anything. 

“Oh probably,” Mick agrees, when Nate finally makes it back to the apartment that they share. He’s barely looking up from his phone as he talks. Finally late enough in the night that he’s able to talk to his own soulmate, currently thousands of miles away from them, on a trip to  _ Look at art  _ in Sweden. 

Which Nate pretends not to know exactly what that is code for. 

“Ouch?”

“It’s a joke, pretty,” Mick replies. Only then glancing up and catching the serious look in Nate’s eyes. “You’re going about this the wrong way?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Mick explains, “Instead of saying some cute shit back to everyone you meet, say something that will actually be noticeable.” 

“Like ‘You wanna rob a bank’,” Nate replies. All too aware of what his roommate’s soulmate mark says. 

Mick grunts in reply.

Not an answer.

But it’s not a terrible idea. 

“You know,” Nate says, “You’re surprisingly insightful when you want to be.” 

“It’s the beer,” Mick replies.

Before going back to ignoring Nate.

Which is fine because it gives him an idea.

And Nate Heywood having ideas has only ever ended well. 

Or… Something like that. 

Suddenly instead of just saying hello back to every  _ Hey  _ that Nate gets, or even his previously over eager ‘ _ Wait, are you my soulmate?!’,  _ he turns to shouting out random things instead. The sort of things that there would be no way to make a mistake about it.

Sure it’s no tentacle kink.

Because Nate isn’t quite ready to invoke the level of wrath that Ava feels for whomever her future soulmate turns out to be. 

Not yet at least.

But it’s something different. 

Something that earns him weird looks and usually the desperate need to explain himself afterwards when inevitably whatever weird thing he has said in reply to the latest random stranger just leads to confusion and not the discovery of the soulmate that he had been waiting his whole life for.

“You just have to wait for the universe to tell you when it’s time,” the ever insightful Amaya says. 

Easy for her to say, when her own soulmate Zari is getting them coffee. They’re perfect for each other. Amaya’s own soulmate mark was an order for four dozen donuts, and had led to Amaya opening up her own cafe. Words she probably heard a dozen times before they were finally spoken by the right person - or, maybe not exactly since  _ four  _ dozen was a lot of donuts. 

If anyone would get it, he supposes Amaya is the closest to it. 

Or Zari with a ‘ _ Oh wow, that’s a lot _ ’ along her ribcage.

Nate rubs at the first syllable of his name there against his cheekbone, wishing for not the first time that they word might just disappear.

“The Universe sure is taking its sweet time,” Nate bemoans. 

“So is Zari,” Amaya counters. Looking over her shoulder to where her soulmate is. She pauses at the sight of Zari talking to somebody that Nate doesn’t know, but somebody that Amaya must, because she waves them both over, and turns back to Nate - “You haven’t met Ray yet have you? He’s another regular, new to the city.” 

Amaya has a habit of this.

Introducing him to her regulars.

In hopes that something might happen.

He’s not in the mood, not after this going wrong so many times, not after an awkward encounter on the train this morning when in reply to the usual word from a disgruntled businessman who he had bumped into hard enough to cause the other man to spill his coffee, Nate had snapped ‘ _ Not this again’  _ and promptly exitted the train two stops too early. 

He’s about to tell Amaya this. 

Except when this  _ Ray  _ comes closer.

Nate realizes that despite Amaya insisting that they hadn’t actually met there was something familiar about Ray. 

Once he got past the fact that he was struck by how attractive the man was, exactly Nate’s type, enough that had he met Ray on a night out, Nate would have said  _ fuck it  _ to the whole soulmate concept and tried to convince the man before him to go home with him for the night. 

Once he got past the feeling tight feeling in chest that the proximity to this stranger brought. 

Because this was the very same guy from the train this morning.

But instead of looking disgruntled and half-asleep, he looks wide awake and almost happy to see Nate.

“You,” Nate starts, then stops, unsure how to continue.

Unsure what to say.

Maybe an apology.

But this Ray is still smiling, so happy that Nate wonders how a person can even be that happy. 

“I think you might be my soulmate,” Ray says.

And wouldn’t that explain the way Nate’s heart seems to have kicked into overdrive at just the sight of him. 

Amaya and Zari are confused, of course, but Nate hardly pays them attention, when Amaya says - “No, his word is  _ Hey _ , can’t you see it.” 

Not when Nate is there, opening up the palm of his hand for Nate to see those three words written in what can only be Nate’s sloppy handwriting -  _ Not this again _ . 

  
  


(“Sorry, I made you wait so long,” Ray tells him later, with the palm of his hand pressed against the word on Nate’s cheekbone. 

Fire burning through Nate’s veins. 

A feeling of rightness finally in the universe. 

“It was worth the wait.”)


End file.
